Be a dork and be proud (because you can).   How do you slow down and learn about each student, and communicate with them as individuals, rather than as a monolithic THEM? Writing? Talking? Use some class time to talk about some project or something, as a way of opening up the channels?   Remember the theme of the lesson. When you have discussion, roaming is good, but be sure to connect it all.   Using class time to choose speech/paper topics leads to chaos.   "Create your own discussion questions" should be accompanied, at least at first, by a lesson in making good questions.   Practice what you preach: "Write so that you cannot possibly be misunderstood." You said, "Write a paragraph about any two of the following." What you meant was, "Write one paragraph each about any two of the following."   I tend to let people go to the bathroom or lockers or whatever, pretty much indiscriminately. There may be a time when I won't be able to do that. I don't have much practice at that kind of monitoring.   In "Black. White." the black family says whites are more inquisitive and curious, while blacks are like, "Why do you want to know all that?" That reminds me of some of the reactions I got to journal assignments at MHSA.   Kids, many of them, just don't know how to act normal. Teachers, many of us, have this big agenda of shattering the constraints of self-imposed mediocrity, but often we're teaching to THEM what we need to be learning OURSELVES. We're the ones who act too normal, because we've learned too thoroughly how. We're the ones who have internalized all the niceties of expected social interactivity, for better and for worse.   Studying living people would be way more interesting than studying people on a TV show.   If it's not working, one thing you can ask is, what would make it work for you? Then you can try to ask or figure out what would make it work for other people.   "So what do you guys think of this TV show so far?" is not so terribly effective, because either they all try to answer at once, or else a few of them just mumble. How else could you do that--assuming you're really interested in the answer.   Oh yeah--don't trust the little fuckers. Don't assume they're "cool." Don't assume they think it's cool if YOU're "cool." In fact, assume that they'll tattle on you like little bitches if they get the chance. Or, to put that a different way, the generation gap, at least here at West, takes an inverted form compared to the past or to my expectations. This generation is alien to me because they are MORE conservative and sensitive. Maybe having been born bathed in the omnichromatic light of the Internet has something to do with that; I can tell you I certainly never would have expected that a student would tell on me for looking at Yahoo Mail avatars, for fuck's sake. But hey, I guess that's the environment I'm dealing with here--one aspect of it, anyway.   NOTE TO SELF (AGAIN): Read To Kill a Mockingbird. They seem to like it. Better than they like Catcher in the Rye, anyway. (Why?)   fAKE dISCUSSIONS: They know how to say just enough of a prompt, without having read the book, to get the teacher, out of desperation or passion, to go off on a tangent and fill in the "meaning" for them.   Dude. DON'T ASK QUESTIONS YOU DON'T HAVE SUBSTANTIVE ANSWERS FOR!!!!!!!!!!! [or at least follow-up questions for ;-)]   So I saw Travis from 5th hour at McDonald's after the damn van wouldn't start. He said, Hi Mr. Schulte, and I said, Hey Travis. I was glad I remembered his name. He's one of the ones who are easy to remember, I guess because he's not one of the ones who seems to look or act exactly like a dozen others. Anyhoo, he and his friend actually came out to the parking lot and poked around under the hood of the van. We didn't get it started, but it was awfully nice. And I wonder if that would have happened if I hadn't given him a pencil that day. That day when he said, "You're nicer than some."   "...lots of time you don't know what interests you most till you start talking about something that doesn't interest you most. What I mean is, you're supposed to leave somebody alone if he's at least being interesting and he's getting all excited about something." --HC    Part of my problem is (too much...bar-be-cue!), I feel like a hypocrite trying to demand a higher standard of performance and behavior from my students than I supply myself.    See, here's the thing. I think I can really be good at this. I really do. Right now there are these traps and wells that suck up and constrain too much of my energy. I don't have boundless energy at this time. There are limits to what I can muster. Right now, too much energy goes into worrying about looking stupid. Too much goes into the print shop. Those are the main ones. There's also the job hunt, and fun things like the girls and all. The point is, I need more energy and time to go to teaching if I'm going to be a good teacher. Period. I need to insist on my own visibility, and I need to give it more loving, attentive time. There has to be a way to make that happen. This isn't an excuse; it's an equation.   It helps to know the source of what you know. I know how to use relative pronouns, but before I looked over that grammar book this morning, I would have been hard pressed to label one. You can't just whip through someone's paper making corrections, or fly through a novel revealing glorious analytical insights, without being able to show them the path you took to get to that level of skill. Back it up, jack. Basic kicks and defenses. Every day.   Chase in Life Themes really called me out on the "Peter Pan Syndrome" discussion. "What does this have to do with Life Themes?" I stumbled a little over the answer. But it was a good reminder to keep the theme in mind (not to mention, not to BS your way through discussions. Which I didn't. Not totally. Not today. When I accidentally lead/follow the discussion into a place of honesty, that feels really good. Not a recitation, not somebody else's critique, but my own contribution, coming even as it did today after a stumbling bumbling stammering halting disjointed tooth-pulling event, namely, the end of Catcher in the Rye. How he misses everybody. How life touched him after all. Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. No matter how screwed up it seems--even this moment right now (Sam laughed) is still your real, actual life. Don't it always seem to go.... How when you wake up from a dream and think, maybe I'd like to go back there. How one day we're going to wake up from this dream, and wish we could go back, so, enjoy it. That felt real, saying that stuff. And--here's the important bit I'm trying to get at here--it was unplanned, but it came around because of the foundation of the stuff that was planned. See?   "They're conservative, very sensitive about computer issues, they like to be directed, their parents believe in homework....” This is not your idea of High School.   As far as the tattler? Now I'm starting to think it was Rachel. Which actually makes it not so bad. Like, she was trying to do what she has taken on as her job, and was having a problem, and because of the student/substitute teacher dynamic, didn't feel comfortable confronting me. That actually seems pretty reasonable. If it WAS her..... Also, how she mentioned after the fact about how sometimes she had trouble getting the other students to do their work and stuff... because she's a student. Yeah, it all kinda fits. I could see her going to DS and saying I wasn't helping at all. Which I wasn't. So yeah.   On the other hand, it may have been Alysha because she's such a snotty bitch.   The 9th graders are happy and chipper; the tenth graders are just sort of normal; the seniors are half dead. We should not be blaming them for being disrespectful. We should be asking ourselves why the hell high school is killing them. (Or, to be fair, if it's something else, then what....)   Why do I care so much what Chase A. thinks of me? He's like the embodiment of every smart, smart-ass hacker genius kid on the Internet with whom I've silently sided in each snide aside to deride and denude the deluded--yeah, anyway. I can just imagine his blog entry a few years from now, talking about how English teachers in high school served up so much bullshit, but--yeah. Why do I care so much?   SPECIFICITY!!! Even (especially?) in the discussion of abstract concepts. About the "catcher in the rye" passage, you said "Is there a practical way to pursue that impulse in society?" But you forgot to go into detail about what that impulse is. Even if you think it seems obvious to you (it probably doesn't seem as obvious as you think, once you start thinking about it). SLOW DOWN, bro. Nevermind the sneers and yawns and snickers and outright contempt. SAY WHAT YOU HAVE TO SAY! (But hey--props for trying, at least.)   Okay. You want to know the truth about that? The biggest disappointment was not the overall failure of the attempt to engage, but the fact that Chase didn't give a shit. I'm like a spurned preteen, for schit's sake. I was trying to talk about something important from the book, something that directly tied in with the theme of the unit, and I almost didn't even bother when I thought he wasn't coming to class, and then when he did, and I did, and he didn't even twitch an eyebrow, let alone look up once, well, it kinda popped my little red balloon.   The essay writing review might have worked better if you had forced the interaction by asking questions, instead of just zippity-zipping through it telling them all the points you wanted to make.   "However lousy it is to sit in your basement and pretend to be an elf, I can tell you from personal experience it's worse to sit in your basement and try to figure if Ginger or Mary Ann is cuter. And I'm willing to raise that to a general principle. It's better to do something than to do nothing. Even lolcats, even cute pictures of kittens made even cuter with the addition of cute captions, hold out an invitation to participation. When you see a lolcat, one of the things it says to the viewer is, "If you have some sans-serif fonts on your computer, you can play this game, too." And that's message--I can do that, too--is a big change."  http://www.herecomeseverybody.org/2008/04/looking-for-the-mouse.html   Sometimes a room breathes better with the door open. Even if there's a little noise in the hall, it's sometimes worse to close the door, because doing so seems to encourage breaking of the resulting over-silence. Or something.   Weird... Alysha seems to have lost the attitude. She's being nice. Wonder what happened? Maybe it helped that I went to her and made sure she had everything she needed after being out sick, and gave her extra time to turn stuff in. Or maybe it never had anything to do with me in the first place.   Had the slightly bemusing experience today of a kinf of reverse anachronism: I was explaining to someone how to get the best use out of a thesaurus, following from word to word. It's like following links on a computer, I finally told her. Only it's all in one book!   I explain a simple concept about writing a thesis statement to Paulene, and she says, "You're a good teacher." Well, even if she's just blowing smoke, it's still a lot nicer to hear than some of the other stuff I've heard....   Pussed out on discussion in 3rd hour today. Put it off til tomorrow. Now we're doing basically nothing. A few are finishing their (late) papers. You talk in interviews about expectations and firmness, but why then do you consistently fail to pull it off with seniors? Do you think they'll respect you for not giving a shit about your own assignments? How long do you think you can play this game? Meanwhile, Holden Caulfield Allen smirks.   I have pretty much zero credibility. They miss their real teacher. They're polite about it, but still. Not that I expected to oust him from favor, but still. And I keep telling myself that I fail because I am not prepared. Because of the other job, time, exhaustion, etcetera. But maybe there's something else going on here. Maybe there's something missing besides preparation. Maybe it's just giving a shit, standing up, speaking out, caring enough. Maybe what I've been doing instead of teaching is shrinking, avoiding, fleeing, making excuses. Maybe? Yeah. Right. Maybe.   Okay, so I'm failing. So what? That's always the question, isn't it? Same old, same old. But no, really. So I'm failing. So what?   Um. Here's one thing you could do: Vocalize. When someone says, "Can I go to the bathroom?" answer them. Don't just nod, and do that half-grunt in the back of your throat that you've been doing for years. Same for when you're in the hallway. Either say hello to someone, or don't. Cut out this stupid, sheepish, "h--" thing. It's disgusting, really. Talk, or don't talk. I'm beginning to really understand how much work it is to be a good teacher. You have to have a thesis each day. It's like writing a research paper every night, then presenting one every day. I can also see how that gets easier; you can reuse your theses, as long as you can keep your presentations fresh.  One word: commitment. Here's that webnote to/from B. Peters: Subject: RE: Catcher in the Rye Literary Analysis help! From: Michael Mueller Date: 5/2/2008 8:59:00 AM To: Bryan Peters [Read: 5/3/2008] Bryan, 
I did not intend to intercept or spy on a private communication between you and Mr. Mueller; however, email and webnotes are among the responsibilities he assigned to me during his leave. He has not, as far as I know, been checking either of them. 
I apologize for my inexperience. I am still learning how to do this. That, of course, shouldn’t have to be your problem; if it’s any consolation, future students will benefit from the mistakes you’re putting up with now. 
In the meantime, please let me try to help you with your paper. 
Judging from the wealth of details in your MySpace page, you have a good sense of the book in general, and Holden's personality in particular. (The Phoebe picture is hilarious, by the way.) 
Remember, you are primarily analysing the novel. Your project is an additional resource to help you do that. So, you will probably want to start the paper with a specific thesis. Just as an example, “In navigating the fine line between childhood and adulthood, Holden Caulfield faces many of the same problems as teens face today.” Then find examples in the novel that support the thesis, as you would do in any literary analysis. (You could also expand on that idea by pointing out ways in which Holden’s adolescence is not the same as a teenager’s today.) In addition, explain ways in which your project further illuminates or illustrates the thesis. What insights or thoughts did you have when you were reading, that led you to decide what to put into your project? Perhaps the fact that it is possible to make a plausible MySpace page for Holden indicates something about the similarities between him and a present-day teen. 
Other interesting questions to consider, perhaps in a concluding paragraph: 
If HC was around today, would he likely use something like MySpace? How would the omnipresence of this kind of technological social networking affect his outlook? Would he find it easier to connect with others or not? 
I hope that helps. If you have any other questions, please let me know. - Mr. Schulte -----Original Message----- From: Bryan Peters To: Michael Mueller Date: 5/1/2008 4:12:00 PM Subject: Catcher in the Rye Literary Analysis help!     Mr. Mueller, I'm having some problems getting my Literary Analysis started for the fake Myspace I made and even though Mr. Schulte's a pretty cool guy I don't think he'd be of any help.  I was just wondering if you could get me started in the right direction for the :     Introduction     Conclusion     And      How you want me to describe the Myspace that I made and how the stuff relates to the novel.     Any and all help is appreciated because I have a mental block about this analysis.  Thank you very much :) You should always do your own assignments. It all makes sense now: my wife is the Queen of Swords (she handed me the card over a week ago, while I was out back with the smoker, and it took me til now to make the connection. Amazing!). I've never had one of those before. Rock on. You really do need to specify things like font, size, style, spacing.... Or else they just go nuts.   Have them put their names on the back or something. It really does help the grading process not to be aware of whose paper you're grading.   What is it about my speaking demeanor that makes me soporific to the juniors and seniors? Is it them? Is it me? Can I learn how to imbue what I'm saying with such life that even their apathy will not sap my will and bedrizzle my words with defensive boredom?   How (besides 8th hour) can I make this experience not to have been a failure? You're asking the right questions, but remember, answers require action.   So far, the problem is not a lack of ideas, but how easy it is to get away without applying any.   WHY DO YOU WANT TO BE A TEACHER? I believe 9th grade should be the last year for kids to go to regular schools. After that, they should have options for continuing their education. Separate schools modeled after colleges not high schools? Apprenticeships? Independent study? Quests? Group explorations with teacher-facilitators? Whatever they choose, they should have a hand in formulating the parameters, and, to some extent, even the rules. But there should still be accountability. All I know is, what we seem to have right now kind of pretty much on the whole for the most part . . . sucks. We offer them discussions that are over their heads and therefore boring, or pedantic pedagogies that they've long since outgrown. Oh yeah, and movies. We show a fucking lot of movies. They're adolescents; they're growing up faster than we are. We should stop cramming re-runs of ninth grade into their heads. I want to be a teacher so that I can work my way out from the inside. I need the real experience in the field in order to become a reformer. That's my real dream. No, I didn't always dream of being an English teacher. Often, so far, I can honestly say that I don't even like being an English teacher. But I do dream of graduating Holden Caulfield to the next level, where he can actually make the world a less phony place, through loving exertions, not through bitter withdrawal. I can see things that are phony and wrong, and I would like to attack some of those before I kick the fucking bucket, before I find myself getting a nice retirement party in the teacher's lounge, surrounded by pale tan cinderblocks, utility tables, some cake stuck to a spatula, and no idea what I've spent my life on or why. Maybe everyone says this. Maybe 99 point 9 of them say this and then get a job and find out how easy it is to get along. I'm sure I could do that. Maybe. Maybe not; there's some reason I haven't been hired yet. I think, I hope, that the main reason is that I haven't let the real dream shine out of my face yet. I've been trying to say what I'm supposed to say, and I suck at that. I've been so polite. Hiding the smoke when I secretly want to fan the flames.